Lian makes 4 !
9/16/07 Family Night
Housekeeping note – Mr. Perfect proofreader would like me to let you know that while Lela’s favorite dessert is ice cream, her favorite desert is the Gobi.
So how did our Family Day go? Well, “near fiasco” springs to mind – but let’s start at the very beginning.
Sleep was the concept, not the reality. As we rolled along in the dark, I lay there jammed between the metal bed guardrail and Lela the human thrashing machine, wondering where I had stashed my Ambien. Lela slept soundly until about 5. We pulled back the curtains and watched the sun rise over the countryside, a mix of steep mountains scraped with white chalk, plunging gorges, farms of corn, sunflowers, peach trees, and unidentifiable vegetables terraced into every conceivable slope. Part of the land is carved down into sandstone, with pillars and levels of soft golden stone catching the early sun. The houses we pass are made of yellow brick, presumably from the sandstone. We see early risers, one man doing toe touches atop a giant pile of coal, farmers hoeing the fields, two women and a man clearing a slope I would call a cliff. We pass cities hazed with smog, huge coal and nuclear power plants on one side and the steep green mountains on the other. The train begins to wake up as we near Xi’an for our 8:20 arrival. We get a cup of over brewed green tea from the stewardess (no bargain at 10RMB.) Jamie and Lela head off in search of the dining car. It is a snack car for passengers, with drinks, cookies, and other packaged food – but the staff are getting hot noodles and congee. They do find Lela’s favorite Chinese rice cookies.
We dress and perform our ablutions in the toilet or washroom. Someone stole both rolls of toilet paper about 10 minutes into the trip, but luckily we have lots of wipes. The water tap has that international “don’t drink” symbol, the X’ed glass, so we are glad we brought 4 bottles.
Lela, having a new audience in Elizabeth is regaling her with one of her games, where she makes up the rules, half the words and they can change at will. Given that Elizabeth’s high school English is as rusty as our French, God knows what she actually understands, but she is a good sport and finds it amusing. Actually the whole train finds Lela amusing and her pig tails and cheeks get little tweaks as she trots along the corridor sticking her nose in. The compartment next to us has two Chinese moms with three children. Lela spends some time playing with the 18 month old and scores a Chinese version of a moon pie.
After chugging through increasingly denser suburbs, we reach the Xi’an train station. It’s not nearly as imposing as the Beijing station, that looked like a set for a 1930’s film noir. We hump the luggage off (keeping track with a tune set to the 12 days of Xmas – 4 oversized suitcases, 3 bulging back packs, 2 assorted carry-ons, and an umbrella stroooler =10.) There is no one there on the platform to meet us. A porter takes our bags up to the exit. There are lots of people with signs, but none for Pines. We circle around, looking, looking. The porter is getting impatient. Just when we are about to give up and get a cab, a young woman with a sign saying “James Matthew” approached. It’s our new guide, Sherry. She says we have to walk to the car. This proves to be a hefty half mile NYC paced walkathon along the side of the Xi’an city wall. The batteries in my camera chose this minute to die. Finally we are in the van, on the way on the hotel. I can hardly wait for a bath. I feel like I have been covered with fly paper, sticky on one side, scratchy on the other.
The Sofitel is vast and we arrive at the wrong wing. After an underground hike, we finally arrive at the right check-in desk and find our room won’t be ready for 15 minutes – which means about an hour. We have to give them a $300 cash deposit, as our credit card is still not working. On the bright side, they cash our travelers check with no problems. After three days Lela’s bowels start to work again, necessitating many dashes across the lobby. The lobby, well let’s just say some designer really sold a concept. It is aggressively moderne, with lacquer red womb chairs and sofas, a screen of crystal ball beads dangling from the ceiling, artfully placed modern sculpture, and strange upright objects of red pleated silk, bringing to mind gift-wrapped pod people.
Finally in our room. We find out we are getting Lian at 5, and the other families are flying in that afternoon. We unpack, get a crib sent in, organize paperwork, tidy up. Lela and I take a bath in the huge tub and I take a shower too. Ah, clean again. If only I could do the same for our clothing which is getting limited. Lela falls asleep and Jamie goes out to see if he can find food. He returns with some very spicy tofu thing and noodles with diced veggies also very spicy. I correctly predict Miss blander the better will not eat it. Jamie and Lela go down to the swimming pool. I was going to join them or take a nap but never got the time to do either. My eyes feel like an ad for Visine and my brain is got that lovely cotton-wool sleep deprivation thing going on. They return, and with the hotel technical desk on the phone, Jamie finally gets the internet connection going. Then suddenly it’s 4:45 – time to go!
We meet the other families, the Littles and Schwartzes, in the lobby. I know Michelle and Anne from the internet chat groups and their blogs. Nice to finally connect. We pile into our van, which zooms out of the courtyard and stops at the next corner where the registrars office is located, a ride of about 2 minutes.
We all wait nervously. Shery tells us that Lian will be coming a half hour latter, since the train from HanZhong (pronounced more like HanChong to my ears) doesn’t get in until 5:10. Since I have a half hour and realize I have left my list of questions at the hotel, I run back, ok, jog wheezily, over acres of slippery pavement (it has now started to rain)and grab that and the passports Sherry forgot to tell us to bring. The two little boys from the Xi’an CWI arrive to meet their families. They play with them on the floor – I take lots of pictures for the Schwartzes. The Littles have their two sons, Jack and Will, with them and Jack does the honors with their camera. 5:40 comes and goes. Sherry is calling on her cell - “they are coming.” 6pm – they have arrived – but not here. 6:30 - rush hour traffic is holding them up – yeah, on a Sunday night. 6:45 - they don’t answer her call. Lela is more nervous than we are and goes into hyper drive, but luckily makes friends with the three children who are there with the registrar and Xi’an director, and they play outside in the parking area. She gets filthy. We all are becoming nervous wreaks. I mentally play every bad scenario I have ever thought of, including the one where we have inadvertently offended the powers that be and its all a cruel hoax.
7pm, an older lady carrying a little girl dressed in yellow with yellow pom-poms on her pigtails appears in the door. I am so relieved I start to cry. I have dragooned Sherry to translate my questions to Lian’s Ayi, who turns out to be her house mama. We are interrupted by the second woman from the SWI, who insists that all the information is in the books they give us, one a picture book, the other a medical and developmental report. There is still almost nothing about her cleft other than the scant sentences we have already gotten, but that is going to be it. They strap Lian into our stroller and leave. Wham, bam, here’s your kid. Sherry hustles us out the door, as all the officials want to go home and the photographer for our visa and adoption decree pictures has been waiting since 5. The bus driver has gone home, so we will walk – not too far she says. About half way through the forced death march across broken sidewalks, 12”curbs, speeding traffic and an underpass, Lela is whining to ride in the stroller, and I realize this is ridiculous – I haven’t held my daughter yet. We switch. Lian is wide-eyed but compliant, holding on to me. She has a runny nose and a little rattley cough. We stop so I can put Lian in the sling we brought and lose the group. They send back Jack. Juggling umbrellas, children, stroller and backpacks, we arrive at the photographer’s. The building common lights are off for the night, so we climb two flights of slippery wet marble stairs in the dark. We ask Jack to take a picture of the four of us while we wait for our turn, first family picture about an hour into our adoption. Back outside the families rebel and insist on taking cabs back to the hotel. Since we are the stragglers (a pattern that will continue) Sherry rides back with us, reiterating we must be ready to go by 8:15 the next morning. Back at the hotel, we’re not done yet. We still need to fill out paperwork for tomorrow and it’s all in Chinese. We commandeer a desk in the lobby, and go over the papers along with the Schwartzes. The Littles have wisely gone up to their room. We finally come up with one black ink pen between us (blue is not acceptable) discover we will need glue sticks to affix our passport pictures (luckily the concierge desk pulls that rabbit out of their hat) and get most of it filled out. Our attention being diverted, Lela is twirling around and zooming the stroller and slams full speed into a pillar, getting a real goose egg on her noggin. She wants me to comfort her, and I have Lian strapped to my chest. I manage to cuddle both of them, but Lela has her first premonition of the real future – and she doesn’t like it. She wants 100% of mama, 100% of the time.
We finally make it back to our room. It’s after 9. We have no dinner to offer but cheese crackers, goldfish, nasty leftover tofu, and some cookies, but that is going to have to do. I dig out a little musical toy we brought for Lian. Lela shows her how to work the buttons, which she quickly masters. We hear the first of hundreds of renditions of “I’m a little tea pot.” What was I thinking? They play with toy cars on the floor while we try and finish the paperwork, and Lela elicits a tiny smile when she lets out her whiskey and cigarette soaked belly laugh. I am wondering if Lian has a hearing loss from ear infections (very common with cleft kids) since her response to sound is very slow and she has not made a peep – or maybe she’s still in shock. We get both our girls into nighties, brush their teeth, forget to wash any other parts, read a bedtime story which must be total gibberish to Lian, and pop her into her crib. I’m not sure when she fell asleep because I passed out immediately. Thus endeth the first day.
Housekeeping note – Mr. Perfect proofreader would like me to let you know that while Lela’s favorite dessert is ice cream, her favorite desert is the Gobi.
So how did our Family Day go? Well, “near fiasco” springs to mind – but let’s start at the very beginning.
Sleep was the concept, not the reality. As we rolled along in the dark, I lay there jammed between the metal bed guardrail and Lela the human thrashing machine, wondering where I had stashed my Ambien. Lela slept soundly until about 5. We pulled back the curtains and watched the sun rise over the countryside, a mix of steep mountains scraped with white chalk, plunging gorges, farms of corn, sunflowers, peach trees, and unidentifiable vegetables terraced into every conceivable slope. Part of the land is carved down into sandstone, with pillars and levels of soft golden stone catching the early sun. The houses we pass are made of yellow brick, presumably from the sandstone. We see early risers, one man doing toe touches atop a giant pile of coal, farmers hoeing the fields, two women and a man clearing a slope I would call a cliff. We pass cities hazed with smog, huge coal and nuclear power plants on one side and the steep green mountains on the other. The train begins to wake up as we near Xi’an for our 8:20 arrival. We get a cup of over brewed green tea from the stewardess (no bargain at 10RMB.) Jamie and Lela head off in search of the dining car. It is a snack car for passengers, with drinks, cookies, and other packaged food – but the staff are getting hot noodles and congee. They do find Lela’s favorite Chinese rice cookies.
We dress and perform our ablutions in the toilet or washroom. Someone stole both rolls of toilet paper about 10 minutes into the trip, but luckily we have lots of wipes. The water tap has that international “don’t drink” symbol, the X’ed glass, so we are glad we brought 4 bottles.
Lela, having a new audience in Elizabeth is regaling her with one of her games, where she makes up the rules, half the words and they can change at will. Given that Elizabeth’s high school English is as rusty as our French, God knows what she actually understands, but she is a good sport and finds it amusing. Actually the whole train finds Lela amusing and her pig tails and cheeks get little tweaks as she trots along the corridor sticking her nose in. The compartment next to us has two Chinese moms with three children. Lela spends some time playing with the 18 month old and scores a Chinese version of a moon pie.
After chugging through increasingly denser suburbs, we reach the Xi’an train station. It’s not nearly as imposing as the Beijing station, that looked like a set for a 1930’s film noir. We hump the luggage off (keeping track with a tune set to the 12 days of Xmas – 4 oversized suitcases, 3 bulging back packs, 2 assorted carry-ons, and an umbrella stroooler =10.) There is no one there on the platform to meet us. A porter takes our bags up to the exit. There are lots of people with signs, but none for Pines. We circle around, looking, looking. The porter is getting impatient. Just when we are about to give up and get a cab, a young woman with a sign saying “James Matthew” approached. It’s our new guide, Sherry. She says we have to walk to the car. This proves to be a hefty half mile NYC paced walkathon along the side of the Xi’an city wall. The batteries in my camera chose this minute to die. Finally we are in the van, on the way on the hotel. I can hardly wait for a bath. I feel like I have been covered with fly paper, sticky on one side, scratchy on the other.
The Sofitel is vast and we arrive at the wrong wing. After an underground hike, we finally arrive at the right check-in desk and find our room won’t be ready for 15 minutes – which means about an hour. We have to give them a $300 cash deposit, as our credit card is still not working. On the bright side, they cash our travelers check with no problems. After three days Lela’s bowels start to work again, necessitating many dashes across the lobby. The lobby, well let’s just say some designer really sold a concept. It is aggressively moderne, with lacquer red womb chairs and sofas, a screen of crystal ball beads dangling from the ceiling, artfully placed modern sculpture, and strange upright objects of red pleated silk, bringing to mind gift-wrapped pod people.
Finally in our room. We find out we are getting Lian at 5, and the other families are flying in that afternoon. We unpack, get a crib sent in, organize paperwork, tidy up. Lela and I take a bath in the huge tub and I take a shower too. Ah, clean again. If only I could do the same for our clothing which is getting limited. Lela falls asleep and Jamie goes out to see if he can find food. He returns with some very spicy tofu thing and noodles with diced veggies also very spicy. I correctly predict Miss blander the better will not eat it. Jamie and Lela go down to the swimming pool. I was going to join them or take a nap but never got the time to do either. My eyes feel like an ad for Visine and my brain is got that lovely cotton-wool sleep deprivation thing going on. They return, and with the hotel technical desk on the phone, Jamie finally gets the internet connection going. Then suddenly it’s 4:45 – time to go!
We meet the other families, the Littles and Schwartzes, in the lobby. I know Michelle and Anne from the internet chat groups and their blogs. Nice to finally connect. We pile into our van, which zooms out of the courtyard and stops at the next corner where the registrars office is located, a ride of about 2 minutes.
We all wait nervously. Shery tells us that Lian will be coming a half hour latter, since the train from HanZhong (pronounced more like HanChong to my ears) doesn’t get in until 5:10. Since I have a half hour and realize I have left my list of questions at the hotel, I run back, ok, jog wheezily, over acres of slippery pavement (it has now started to rain)and grab that and the passports Sherry forgot to tell us to bring. The two little boys from the Xi’an CWI arrive to meet their families. They play with them on the floor – I take lots of pictures for the Schwartzes. The Littles have their two sons, Jack and Will, with them and Jack does the honors with their camera. 5:40 comes and goes. Sherry is calling on her cell - “they are coming.” 6pm – they have arrived – but not here. 6:30 - rush hour traffic is holding them up – yeah, on a Sunday night. 6:45 - they don’t answer her call. Lela is more nervous than we are and goes into hyper drive, but luckily makes friends with the three children who are there with the registrar and Xi’an director, and they play outside in the parking area. She gets filthy. We all are becoming nervous wreaks. I mentally play every bad scenario I have ever thought of, including the one where we have inadvertently offended the powers that be and its all a cruel hoax.
7pm, an older lady carrying a little girl dressed in yellow with yellow pom-poms on her pigtails appears in the door. I am so relieved I start to cry. I have dragooned Sherry to translate my questions to Lian’s Ayi, who turns out to be her house mama. We are interrupted by the second woman from the SWI, who insists that all the information is in the books they give us, one a picture book, the other a medical and developmental report. There is still almost nothing about her cleft other than the scant sentences we have already gotten, but that is going to be it. They strap Lian into our stroller and leave. Wham, bam, here’s your kid. Sherry hustles us out the door, as all the officials want to go home and the photographer for our visa and adoption decree pictures has been waiting since 5. The bus driver has gone home, so we will walk – not too far she says. About half way through the forced death march across broken sidewalks, 12”curbs, speeding traffic and an underpass, Lela is whining to ride in the stroller, and I realize this is ridiculous – I haven’t held my daughter yet. We switch. Lian is wide-eyed but compliant, holding on to me. She has a runny nose and a little rattley cough. We stop so I can put Lian in the sling we brought and lose the group. They send back Jack. Juggling umbrellas, children, stroller and backpacks, we arrive at the photographer’s. The building common lights are off for the night, so we climb two flights of slippery wet marble stairs in the dark. We ask Jack to take a picture of the four of us while we wait for our turn, first family picture about an hour into our adoption. Back outside the families rebel and insist on taking cabs back to the hotel. Since we are the stragglers (a pattern that will continue) Sherry rides back with us, reiterating we must be ready to go by 8:15 the next morning. Back at the hotel, we’re not done yet. We still need to fill out paperwork for tomorrow and it’s all in Chinese. We commandeer a desk in the lobby, and go over the papers along with the Schwartzes. The Littles have wisely gone up to their room. We finally come up with one black ink pen between us (blue is not acceptable) discover we will need glue sticks to affix our passport pictures (luckily the concierge desk pulls that rabbit out of their hat) and get most of it filled out. Our attention being diverted, Lela is twirling around and zooming the stroller and slams full speed into a pillar, getting a real goose egg on her noggin. She wants me to comfort her, and I have Lian strapped to my chest. I manage to cuddle both of them, but Lela has her first premonition of the real future – and she doesn’t like it. She wants 100% of mama, 100% of the time.
We finally make it back to our room. It’s after 9. We have no dinner to offer but cheese crackers, goldfish, nasty leftover tofu, and some cookies, but that is going to have to do. I dig out a little musical toy we brought for Lian. Lela shows her how to work the buttons, which she quickly masters. We hear the first of hundreds of renditions of “I’m a little tea pot.” What was I thinking? They play with toy cars on the floor while we try and finish the paperwork, and Lela elicits a tiny smile when she lets out her whiskey and cigarette soaked belly laugh. I am wondering if Lian has a hearing loss from ear infections (very common with cleft kids) since her response to sound is very slow and she has not made a peep – or maybe she’s still in shock. We get both our girls into nighties, brush their teeth, forget to wash any other parts, read a bedtime story which must be total gibberish to Lian, and pop her into her crib. I’m not sure when she fell asleep because I passed out immediately. Thus endeth the first day.
No comments:
Post a Comment